Event Details

Fail Fast. Succeed Faster. Lean Startup Machine is an intensive 3 day workshop that gives you the ability to disrupt products. You will hear inspiring speeches and get advice from some of the brightest minds in the Chicago community. Bring your team or come alone to pitch an idea.

Mentors and Speakers...

Marina Dedes, Vice President at Lightbank

Sonal Mane, Startup Technologist at Microsoft

Nik Rokop, Managing Director at the Entrepreneurship Center at the Illinois Institute of Technology

Michael "Doc" Norton, Director of Engineering at Groupon

Fred Hoch, President of the Illinois Technology Association (ITA) and Founder of TechNexus

Any startup team, founder, entrepreneur, product person that is in search of building something that people actually want to use. If you're looking for an intense experience that will forever change your life by teaching you lean methodologies you have come to the right place.

This is NOT a hackathon. It's a workshop in which you learn by doing.

Got an idea of your own?

Great! You'll have 50 seconds to give your elevator pitch at the kickoff. After voting, if your idea gets selected you will be able to form a team and start working.

We strongly encourage everyone who comes to Lean to start fresh with a brand new concept.

If you plan to work on an existing project bring at least one co-founder with you to the event. If you have existing co-founders and none of them attend, you'll have to work on a new startup idea. But don't worry, you'll still learn valuable skills that you can apply to your own business.

No co-founders? No problem.

You'll meet many talented and smart people and have the opportunity to hear their new startup ideas.*An existing project is defined as one that already has mockups, prototypes or code associated with it. If that's the case, you cannot recruit others to join you. In the past, we have found that it is too difficult for participants to join a team that already possesses domain knowledge around an existing project.